What's new in avast! version 4.6
The latest version of avast! antivirus - 4.6 - contains the following key enhancements and features listed below.
A complete list of new features can be also found on the avast! Home/Professional Revision History page.
| Main New Features | |
|---|---|
| Web Shield | |
| NNTP (Newsgroup) Scanner | |
| Outlook Express archive unpacker | |
| Lower memory footprint | |
| New language packs | |
| Finer recognition of malware types | |
Web Shield
The main highlight of avast 4.6 is undoubtedly the new avast! on-access scanning provider - Web Shield. It is able to monitor and filter all HTTP traffic coming from the Web sites on the Internet. Since an increasing number of viruses (and other malware, such as adware, spyware and dialers) are being distributed via the World Wide Web, the need for effective countermeasures has also increased. The Web Shield acts as a transparent HTTP proxy and is compatible with all major web browsers, including Microsoft Internet Explorer, FireFox, Mozilla and Opera.
Unlike most competitive solutions, the Web Shield's impact on browsing speed is almost negligible. This is because of a unique feature called "Intelligent Stream Scan" that lets the Web Shield module scan objects on-the-fly, without the need of caching them locally. Stream scanning is performed in operating memory only (without the necessity to flush the contents to disk), providing maximum possible throughput rates.
NNTP (Newsgroup) Scanner
Another important feature of the new avast! 4.6 release is its ability to scan NNTP (Usenet Newsgroup) traffic. While most Usenet newsgroups don't allow binary attachments, some do and actually tend to be a very effective viral infection source. In fact, a large number of recent mass-mailing viruses and worms were initially distributed via Usenet Newsgroups.
NNTP scanning is implemented as an option of the standard Internet Mail provider. Under NT-based operating systems (Windows NT, Windows 2000, Windows XP and Windows 2003) it works fully transparently - such that no reconfiguration of existing newsgroup clients is necessary.
Outlook Express archive unpacker
The latest release also adds the ability to decompress (and disinfect) Microsoft Outlook Express archive files (OE version 5.x and 6) - also known as "dbx" files. Using a simple HDD scan (with archive scanning enabled), an Outlook Express user is now able to detect and remove viruses buried inside all e-mail folders (but still posing a potential risk if activated) - including archived items.
Lower memory footprint
A popular feature, especially among users with low-end hardware, is avast!'s newly redesigned memory allocation scheme. Thanks to optimization of the latest release, the memory consumption of most avast! processes has been reduced considerably. This applies especially to the main avast! antivirus service (ashServ.exe/aswServ.exe) which now uses multiple memory allocation optimization methods.
New language packs
Our continued commitment to internationalization provides one of the key benefits of avast!. During the last 2 years, avast! has been translated to a number of languages, and version 4.6 adds several additional language modules. Today, the following language versions are provided: English, Bulgarian, Czech, Dutch, Finnish, French, German, Hungarian, Italian, Norwegian (coming soon), Korean, Polish, Portuguese, Japanese, Romanian, Russian, Serbian, Slovak, Spanish, Turkish.
Finer recognition of malware types
The avast! teams are constantly adding definitions for new viruses and new threats. Such threats are not just computer viruses anymore, they include threats such as Trojan horses, Internet worms, and also spyware, adware, dialers and other types of malware. As of version 4.6, the malware types are now properly distinguished from each other.
Finally, but not least, with the latest release, avast! now clearly displays the threat type whenever malware is found, and thus gives the user a better insight into what's going on and how to deal with the problem.
